Time To Lay The Ghosts

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AFP/GETTY IMAGES LOST LEADER: Thousands of die-hard Milosevic supporters pack a Belgrade square to bid farewell to their late hero

Serbia was close to arresting Mladic as recently as January, says this official. Back then, police picked up retired Colonel Jovo Djogo, the former chief of Mladic's security detail, who remains in custody. The senior official says that defense minister Zoran Stankovic told Del Ponte to expect Mladic within eight weeks. "We were sure that [Djogo], who was in charge of Mladic for so many years, knows where the general is. But he is not talking." The chances of Mladic being brought in by the end of March, says the official, are now minimal. That would set back Serbia's aspiration to press forward on talks with the E.U. "Serbia is stuck between two extremes: the inside pressure from the [nationalists] and the outside pressure from the West," Vuk Draskovic, Serbian Foreign Minister, tells Time. "We need a break."

Well, fine. But when it comes to arresting indicted war criminals, Serbia has had plenty of breaks. In 2002, according to a recent internal Defense Ministry report, Mladic was under the protection of Serbia's military counterintelligence agency and received a pension from them. Karadzic has been has been sheltering in Bosnia on and off for the past decade. nato troops stationed there have conducted numerous raids looking for him, after being accused of turning a blind eye to his whereabouts in the immediate aftermath of the war. Newly elected leaders of the Serbian part of Bosnia, known as Republika Srpska, say they are stepping up their own search for Karadzic, though few expect results soon.

But authorities in both countries appear to have tried harder in recent months. "I believe that the authorities are now seriously pursuing Mladic," a Western diplomat said last week in Belgrade. Moderates in the government, he said, know that their political survival depends on E.U. aid — which in turn requires action on the fugitives. Defense minister Stankovic says that authorities did succeed in tracking down several locations where Mladic had hidden, and the senior security official says that 30 active or "recently retired" security officers involved in protecting Mladic have been identified. Others are skeptical of such claims. Kandic, the human-rights investigator, says Serbia may never hand over Mladic, since his testimony might confirm Serb guilt for crimes during the Bosnian war. Draskovic, who escaped two assassination attempts during Milosevic's time in power, says he is unimpressed by the efforts of the security services. "Either they are protecting Mladic," he says, "or they are incompetent."

Still, Serbia's efforts to shake off its past, however halting they may be, offer some hope. One day Mladic and Karadzic will likely be caught. One day, Serbia's ambitions to join the E.U. will be met. But you did not have to stand last Saturday in a light rain, under a steel-gray sky, and watch a man who had brought so much misery to so many laid to rest while a reverent crowd mourned his passing, to know that in the Balkans, that will take time.

With reporting by Dejan Anastasijevic/Belgrade and Joost van Egmond/Amsterdam

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